Free Soldiers of Conquest by F. M. Parker Page A

sailors pulled their oars and the boat struggled on.
    The bow of the boat grated on sand and the two forward oarsmen quickly shipped their oars and sprang into the surf. Wading water to their waists, they kept the boat from swinging sideways and broaching as they pulled its bow upon the beach.
    â€œOut! Out! Before we’re rolled.” The coxswain shouted at Grant.
    â€œAbandon ship,” Grant shouted.
    In a flurry of arms and legs, he and his men hastily jumped from the boat and waded to dry ground. Immediately he turned and helped push the boat back into deep water, and the sailors bent to the oars. The remaining boat swept ashore and disgorged its passengers to splash to the shore.
    Grant shouted his men together and led them at a trot along the beach toward the nearest wreck wallowing in the surf. As he drew close the pain-filled screams of injured horses made the hair on the nape of his neck stand erect. One of those cries could be his mare’s.
    â€œYou fifteen men stay with me to unload this ship,” Grant ordered and his hand moved indicating those men he meant. His mare was on this ship and he wanted to be here when she was found.
    â€œSergeant O’Doyle, take the rest of the men and get the horses off that next ship. Move fast! Make the sailors help you unload. Don’t take no for an answer.”
    Grant led his men and the sailors onto the groaning hulk of the old wooden ship and down into its creaking dark holds. He searched hurriedly among the horses, some on their feet, but most lying in tangled mounds on the rounded ship’s side.
    He came upon his horse and his breath caught at the awful sight. The mare was penned beneath two other horses. A crushed eye hung from a socket. Her right front leg was broken with the end of the splintered bone sticking out through the skin. She breathed feebly. Yet her good eye saw him, and she seemed to plead for his help.
    He pulled his pistol and eared back the hammer. He blinked to clear his vision.
    â€œSorry, girl, there’s nothing I can do for you,” he whispered to the faithful mare that had carried him hundreds of miles upon her back and never once let him down. With a stifled sob, he pointed the pistol at a spot between the mare’s eyes and fired.
    He reloaded and went among the horses and shot the ones with broken bodies. God! How horrible it was to shoot a lead ball into those beautiful animals.
    He set the men to work at building a strong tripod using spare ship’s spars, and then to hang a block and tackle from it, all the items being found in the ship’s stores. Fighting to control the frightened horses, they began the long and laborious task of hoisting them one by one from the holds and setting them down upon the beach.

CHAPTER 8
    Early in the afternoon when the storm subsided, Lee came ashore on Collado Beach with Scott, Totten, Beauregard and McClellan in the Massachusett’s gig. Behind them came three boats carrying Scott’s army headquarters’ paraphernalia; official papers, his personal possessions in two trunks, his weapons, and lastly three large tents to house everything. All the men were armed with pistols. The three junior officers also carried full knapsacks and rolled blankets across their shoulders for they wouldn’t be going back aboard ship for days, and then only to get their private belongings.
    As the officers moved up from the beach, Lee scanned the area occupied by the army that was about three hundred yards deep and stretching some half-mile along the shore. Hundreds of brush windbreaks had been built and on the lee side of them off duty men lounged upon their blankets. Lee identified the brigades by the colors of their standards stuck into the sand about each encampment. The sight of the men waiting for the order to move out into hostile ground caused his heart to pick up its tempo. The time had come when he would be put to the test. He felt the ebb of his life running strong